


they came down like knives

by PermianExtinction



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Aftermath - Chuck Wendig
Genre: But He Finally Gets Punched For It, Canon-Typical Violence, Dubious Bonding Over Life or Death Situations, F/M, Hate As Attraction, Rax is a Manipulative Bastard, Survival, Swearing, Unrequited Hate, post Life Debt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-12
Updated: 2016-09-12
Packaged: 2018-08-14 16:53:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8021680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PermianExtinction/pseuds/PermianExtinction
Summary: As the Empire makes its last stand over Jakku, Rae Sloane believes she's about to finish Gallius Rax off for good. She swore to kill him, and now she has him at her mercy; things couldn't be simpler.One decision later, and things couldn't be more complicated.





	they came down like knives

**Author's Note:**

> This fic has been labeled as ongoing, with this chapter being the first of many. I do not, however, have a clear schedule in mind for writing any further. It could be a very long story indeed; it could be a one-shot. For now, it can be read as a one-shot, a sales pitch for this rather unusual little hateship.
> 
> EDIT: Now marked as a one-shot.

They came down like knives.

Yes, knives; great gray knives wielded by a primitive – yet divine – executioner, stabbing down towards the sand, knives that scattered and shattered into flaming coals as they descended, punctuating the cerulean Jakku sky with their smoke.

The Imperial fleet. It was falling.

The mere sight of it was the keenest knife of all to Grand Admiral Rae Sloane, even viewed through a haze of blood and sweat, framed by the durasteel ribcage of the wrecked craft she had landed on the planet in. It was hypnotically horrifying for all of a second, and then she felt the ground shake. The low seismic rumble of a distant impact carried over the dunes, numbing her knees with its intensity. Her fists clenched instinctively, she felt stiff cloth bunched between the fingers of her right hand.

She hadn’t let go, despite the crash. And under her hand, movement – the shallow rise and fall of a breathing body.

Rax was alive.

Good. They weren’t finished yet.

In a burst of strength that she wouldn’t have known she had except for the fact that it was _all_ she had, just the fire in her bones to fuel her, she dragged the man from the wreckage and threw him onto the sand. He seemed dimly aware of pain, if not its source, because he groaned and licked blood off his lip. There was a long gash over his face and it was leaking blood everywhere. Rae was struck by the perverse urge to touch it – maybe dig her fingernails into the wound while she was at it – just to see what temperature it was. Wondering if it was as cold as his skin had been that time he’d dared to kiss her forehead, as if it would soothe her or convince her to trust him. Or worse.

It would please her greatly to know that Gallius Rax bled the same as any other human being.

Once, amid her wanderings through the fogged-over scraps of the Fleet Admiral’s identity, Rae had wondered if he truly was a man, and not something – some Thing – else. But he was a man. Men could be broken, and here he was, breaking. That fact was the last satisfaction left to Rae Sloane, with all of her life’s work coming undone around her.

She did not know the extent of her own injuries. She hardly noticed the limp in her step as she got to her feet. But her eyes were feasting on the sight of _his_ wounds. She could describe each and every one in minute detail.

But why waste time with that when she could make more?

She drew back her leg – the good one or the bad one? she honestly couldn’t tell and didn’t care, but a shuffling sort of half-step was all she could manage – and kicked him in in the gut as he blindly tried to roll over.

That was for the hell they were in right now.

She lifted the same foot and stamped on his hand, hearing the crack of at least two bones in his fingers.

That was for the humiliating debacle he made of the attack on Chandrila.

One more swing of her leg before the other gave out: she kicked him between the legs. He hadn’t flinched at the last two blows, but he let out a weak gasp of agony when the toe of her boot connected.

That was for Adea Rite.

Rae collapsed onto one knee and sucked in a lungful of hot desert air, before slamming her fist against Rax’s face. She’d been hoping to hear his nose break, but the blow had missed, landing on his cheek. She might have the strength of rage fueling her, but it was lacking in accuracy.

Either way, that was for the _lies_. Or maybe just one of them, though she’d have to beat his head into a bloody pulp if he got one punch for each lie.

She’d had plenty to say when she’d confronted him aboard the _Ravager_. She hadn’t given him a chance to _respond_ to her accusations because the Force knew the man’s strongest weapon was his silver tongue. She wasn’t going to let him utter a single damned word. If she’d managed to hold on to her blaster, the confrontation might have been a lot shorter, too. But fighting her way to him – that had been tricky. He’d made it to a shuttle, the very shuttle they had crashed in, and knowing he had tried to flee when he realized she was coming for him had been a delicious thought, a thought that fueled her into attacking him unarmed.

So now, when she grabbed him by his collar and shook him, slamming his head into the sun-baked sand, she had nothing left to say but, “You filth, you stain, you fucking snake, I’ll kill you like you killed my Empire. Bit by bit by bit by _bit_!” Each _bit_ coincided with another smack of Rax’s skull against the ground.

He made a hoarse noise like he was trying to speak. She hesitated. Would he beg for his life? That might be worth hearing, just to know that _he_ knew she had all the power left between them.

His voice was still pitched up from the kick to his groin – he sounded like a child. His black eyes were flicking back and forth, unfocused, when they opened. “Mister… Sheev… said… no one… was allowed here… but me.”

The piece of shit was delirious. He couldn’t even grant her the pleasure of admitting he’d lost. And invoking the dead Emperor like that… Rae felt a fresh bolt of energy course through her, and she wrapped her hands around his neck. Slowly, she began to throttle him.

Heat was consuming her, but she didn’t tie it to the sun’s merciless rays, though Jakku’s star was directly overhead. No, it felt like _hate_ , all the hate in the universe bubbling and seething under her skin. The hate was baking her alive, broiling her bones and eating through her flesh.

That sizzling hate was also making it hard to tell if the Rax’s skin was cold or hot – that curiosity was still not sated – or perhaps it was the fact that the palms of her hands seemed to have been burned past the point of feeling anything. When did that happen? A blaster discharging while she wrenched the barrel away from her face. Some nameless stormtrooper, who had been in the way. Too many things in the way, at first. But now it was just the three of them. Rae Sloane, Gallius Rax, and the Hate.

The Hate noted, not for the first time, that Rax was wearing his military uniform. The garb of a Fleet Admiral, instead of that stupid red robe he donned whenever he felt particularly fucking _extravagant_ about something, which was too often.

Often, but not now, though Rae found a reason to loathe him for his choice of clothes anyway – he didn’t deserve that uniform or that rank. Nor the copious medals he seemed to have acquired, with barely any explanation given for any of them. For all Rae knew, he had simply asked for them on a whim, a narcissistic fancy, and “Mister Sheev” had obliged his wishes.

And so the sight of him in his uniform made her want to choke him even harder. Or maybe, if she had the time and patience, tear it from his back and let him burn and blister under the noon sun, naked as an animal. Let him _rot_.

While contemplating that, some part of Rae’s body simply gave up. Too deep in the thrall of the Hate, she was hardly aware of any pain or fatigue, so which part was a mystery. But for an uncertain number of seconds, her vision whited out.

When she came to, she found that she had remained upright, but her fingers had slackened, and the man whose throat they were wrapped around was staring at her with unclouded eyes. Rae wanted to cut off his windpipe again, but her arms felt like limp slabs of butchered meat. And Rax probably wanted to speak, but he could only heave in air.

Rae didn’t like the look on his face. It wasn’t smug or triumphant, but it was too _focused_. He was thinking, and he had no right to do that, unless his thoughts were unconditional regret over being born.

Come to think of it, there was a kind of focus in his eyes that didn’t seem to suit him. It was as if he was actually seeing reality as it was, instead of imagining it as an elaborate stage.

“Thought of any last words?” Rae eventually spat, while she waited for her arms to work again.

“No,” he croaked. “Have you?”

This was not what she wanted to hear. It sounded like he had figured out a plan. Or, most hideously, this had been the plan _all along_ , and he’d lured her to the shuttle and seduced her with the temptation to beat the snot out of him, and _let_ her do it—

The biggest mind game a man like him could play was the one where he settled back and let his enemies panic while they tried to figure out if they were _over_ estimating him or _under_ estimating him.

“What the fuck,” Rae began, ineloquently.

The shadow fell over them.

Even with the knowledge that her distraction could easily be capitalized on – it was the oldest trick in the galaxy, and even a master of manipulation had to know to fall back on the classics every now and again – Rae looked up.

The broad bow of the _Ravager_ was tilting down towards them, steadily eclipsing the sun. So it too was falling. Most of the ship was still rendered invisible by the angle of the daylight, but the sky was darkening in an accelerated nightfall, and the sun was sheared in half by the silhouette.

If she’d had a speeder or a working shuttle, Rae might have had the slimmest chance of escaping the impact radius before the Super Star Destroyer struck the planet. But on foot, even if her body was functioning at peak capacity (which it was not)?

No. That thing was going to hit them. You couldn’t dodge something the size of a small city.

 _What a thrilling plan_ , Rae thought muzzily. A bruise-colored splodge was floating in the middle of her vision, the result of staring into the sun. _Smash us both to a paste by dropping your entire ship on our heads._ That couldn’t be part of his scheme, could it?

She tore her eyes away from the sky as hands encircled her wrists, but they were gloved and the leather was hot, so she couldn’t tell if—no. Enough. Why did she _care?_ Anyway, if Rax was going to use this as an opportunity to turn the tables on her, it would be a very short-lived victory.

But he didn’t make a move, didn’t pull out a weapon. He seemed to just have been getting her attention. His normally smooth black hair was mussed from the struggle, and it was starting to show signs of curling. There was no distinctive set of phenotypes that defined those humans native to Jakku, as far as Rae had seen, but for the first time she thought, this _could_ be his home planet. Now that he was dirty and disheveled and close to death, he began to fit in.

“Don’t worry,” Rae found herself saying through bared teeth. She hoped it resembled a mere grimace, but it could have been a mad grin. “I’ve got plenty of time to make you pay for what you’ve done.”

And there was so much more he had to answer for. His activities as the Operator, particularly his derailment of the Akiva summit. Maybe stab out his eyes with her thumbs for that. The constant undermining of her authority. Break his jaw, his teeth. If only she had something sharp – then she could exercise more creativity.

And the worst, the _worst_ , the sickest, most vile crime of all, the one she would certainly have to kill him for, before the Star Destroyer struck, was the fact that she’d _known_ what he was, but somehow had wanted to trust him one last time—

“There is still… a chance,” Rax hoarsely whispered. “Of escape. I know where to go.”

Son of a bitch.

 _Come on_ , thought some part of Rae’s mind. _Don’t let this sway you. You have the power to end it all right here and now. Rid the galaxy of this nightmare of a man – you’ll never live to do a greater deed in your life. Gallius Rax must die._

“What the hell do you mean?” Dammit, she had to know. When the _Ravager_ hit Jakku, the force of its collision with the ground would be greater than most large-scale orbital assault missiles. How could you escape that?

The descending ship had already turned a noon day into a strange, unnerving evening, the lighting all wrong, the long shadows absent.

“Underground… A hidden excavation. You… will see.” One hand, the one she’d stepped on just minutes prior, the one with the broken fingers, released her wrist and slid over the sand until it was pointing towards a strange rock formation – sharp pillars supporting nothing but sky scattered in a valley below a nearby cliff.

 _You will see._ No. That didn’t add up. He wasn’t just _telling_ her where to go, leaving her free to abandon him as dead weight. That wasn’t what was happening. She refused to believe that was what was happening.

Hidden. He said it was hidden. There was no way she could find it on her own. And he knew she would not be so foolish as to try. But because he knew, he could make a selfless but risk-free gesture. It would not be the first time he pretended to be magnanimous for his own amusement.

But now Rae couldn’t look away from those accursed rock pillars in the distance, thinking that there might be a _chance_ , because by all the stars in the heavens, was she really ready to die in the hour of her darkest defeat, handing the galaxy over to the New Republic?

“Damn you,” Rae snarled, grabbing hold of his wrist and slinging his arm roughly over her shoulders. “Damn you, _fuck you_ , this isn’t over.” A feral grunt of effort emerged from between her teeth as she strained to stand upright while bearing his weight. “You’ve only… prolonged… your…” She hadn’t decided between ‘punishment’ and ‘suffering’ to complete that sentence, but all that she managed was a ragged scream as her injured leg finally got through to her brain.

“Walk,” Rax commanded, his voice low and cold, right in her ear.

It ignited the Hate with such a fervent and ugly passion that she found herself lurching forwards, taking a step.

Then another.

“ _Walk_ ,” the man growled again. His fingers dug into her side as he found his footing.

_You don’t give me orders, you foul, sick creature. Never again, not for an instant, I will not serve you—_

But now that she was up, she had to keep going. And not at this sluggish power droid’s pace either. What light was left was a grotesque flickering, coming from the fires erupting on the titanic vessel hanging over their heads. She heard rumbling, like a thunderstorm was coming, but knew it was the sound of explosions throughout the ship.

It was terrifying.

Fear propelled her forward one step. Hate pushed her to take another. It became a rhythm, alternating between the two, like her labored breaths. Breathe in: hate as hot as fire. Breathe out: fear as cold as ice.

But it was working. That was the worst, the sickest, most vile crime of all. That after everything, even after vowing never to rest until the betrayer of the Empire was dead, she would be forced to trust him one last time…

… again.


End file.
